Sovereign Regeneration======================Acts 9:1–19 “Falling to the ground he heard a voice saying to him, ‘Saul,Saul, why are you persecuting me?’ And he said, ‘Who are you, Lord?’” (vv.4–5a).

We made the point a few days ago that every Christian tradition has formulatedsome doctrine of regeneration. Despite the differing formulations of thisdoctrine, however, there are ultimately only two different views of the roleof man and the role of God in regeneration: monergism or synergism.

A synergistic view of regeneration says man and God cooperate in bringing newlife to a person. The Lord acts upon the heart of the unbeliever, imploringhim to change. However, though God calls to the heart, regeneration cannotoccur unless the unbeliever, who has the ability to say, “yes,” or “no,”embraces the divine call. There are several problems with this view. First,synergism sees the human will working with the divine will to achievesalvation. Yet we all come into the world spiritually dead and, being dead,cannot take hold of God’s grace unless first moved by His grace (Ps. 51:5;Eph. 2:4–5). Synergism also reverses the order of regeneration and faith.Synergists argue that we first come to faith, and then we are born again. Butif being born again is necessary to see the kingdom (John 3:3), regenerationmust precede faith. After all, you cannot trust the Lord if you cannot see thetruth of His kingdom.

Monergism, on the other hand, says that God’s Spirit is the sole agent inregeneration. God moves sovereignly upon the souls of those He has chosen,enabling them to have faith. He takes the spiritually dead and makes themalive. We are actually born again — regenerated — before we have faith. We arenot born again because we trust Jesus; we trust Jesus because we are bornagain.

God’s sovereignty in regeneration is seen clearly in the account of Paul’sconversion found in today’s passage. Saul of Tarsus was completely unwillingto follow Jesus the Messiah before God took the initiative. He was sohard-hearted, in fact, that he did all he could to destroy the church of JesusChrist. But when Jesus appeared to Him, Saul could not resist. Christ, by HisSpirit, gave Paul the eyes to see the kingdom and to become one of itsgreatest ambassadors (Acts 9:1–19). Had Jesus not overpowered Saul’s naturalinclination against Him, there never would have been an apostle Paul.

Coram deo: Living before the face of God========================================Some of us have had dramatic conversion experiences that we remember vividly.Others cannot remember a time when they did not trust in Jesus. Whatever ourstory, the same God who raised Jesus to life and knocked Saul of Tarsus to theground also overpowered our natural bent against Him. The fact that youbelieve is evidence of the Lord’s mighty working in your life. He loved usenough to seek us out when we were running from Him.